Coffee County highway staff warn paving list limited by state-aid shortfall; bridge choice looms

Ben, a highway office staff member, told the Coffee County highway meeting the county’s remaining paving and bridge funds are limited and that staff must prioritize projects this spring.

“We got a little paving done last fall. And we will probably run out of, our line item for oil. It may be even rock by June,” Ben said, adding that the county’s fiscal year restarts July 1 and that new allotments would come then. He said the county currently has “about 250 some odd thousand dollars to pay with,” which he estimated would pave roughly “about a mile and a half a road.”

Why it matters: with limited state-aid funds and rising asphalt costs, staff said the county will have to choose which roads to finish this spring and which to defer until after the July budget cycle. Ben told the board the county previously spent a separate $3 million allocation over two years and that those funds are now exhausted.

At the meeting Ben described two bridges that compete for…